Kronos Quartet and Peni Candra Rini

Kronos Quartet was founded by violinist David Harrington and has been based in San Francisco for most of its history. The group built its repertoire almost entirely from new commissions and collaborations, recording works by Terry Riley, Philip Glass and Steve Reich, whose Different Trains was written for the quartet, and working with musicians from far outside the concert-hall tradition.

Peni Candra Rini is a composer and sindhen from Central Java, where the sindhen is the solo female voice that weaves through a gamelan ensemble. In this collaboration the quartet takes the place of the gamelan, so her vocal lines, with their ornamented, flexible phrasing, sit over bowed strings rather than bronze percussion.